Ladies&#39; shoes



A. PERUGIA June 18, 1957 LADIES SHOES Filed July 31, 1956 IN V EN TOR. gwaas PER uam ATTOR N5 Y United States Patent LADIES SHOES Andre Perugia, Paris, France, assignor to I. Miller & Sons, Inc., Long Island City, N. Y., a corporation of New York Application July 31, 1956, Serial No. 601,312

2 Claims. (Cl. 36-245) The invention relates to ladies footwear.

The object of the present invention is a ladies shoe having a replaceable heel, specifically designed so that the person using it may, without the use of any tool and without any great exertion remove the heel and replace it by another heel, namely one better suited to what she is wearing or more advisable for the excursion or walk which she intends to take.

For this purpose the invention is characterized essentially by the fact that the heel is held to the shoe by means of a metal tenon, curved along a circular arc in the direction of its length and fastened to the seat of the said heel, the said tenon being engaged by frictional sliding in a slide-way constituting a corresponding mortise fastened below the insole.

The said tenon preferably extends beyond the front edge of the seat of the heel and the mortise slide extends, beyond the end of the said tenon and up to the lower part of the waist, at least in a portion of fiat section, the tenon and the slide being concealed outside the heel by the outsole.

Due to this arrangement, the mortise slide serves as shank piece and the roll of the latter is reinforced, over the greater portion of its length by the tenon which is rigidly connected with the heel.

The attached drawing shows, by way of example, one embodiment of a shoe in accordance with the present invention.

Fig. l is a side view, partly in section, of the shoe with the heel removed.

Fig. 2 is a corresponding bottom view, the sole being partially broken away.

Fig. 3 is a vertical section through the heel shown by itself.

Fig. 4 is an outer view of the entire shoe, with the heel on.

Fig. 5 is a partial cross section along the plane of the line 5--5 of Fig. 4.

Fig. 6 is a fragmentary section showing the automatic locking spring catch.

As can be noted from the drawing (Fig. 3), in accordance with the present invention, the heel 1 is provided with a metal tenon 2, curved along a circular arc in the direction of its length. This tenon protrudes beyond the seat 1a to which it is fastened, for instance by screws 3. In the present embodiment, the tenon 2 (see Fig. 5) has a trapezoidal cross-section (the large base being at top), and it extends (see Fig. 3) far beyond the front edge 1b of the heel seat.

Furthermore (see Figs. l and 2) below the insole 4 of the shoe, there is fastened a mortise slide 5 which is curved with the same radius of curvature as the tenon 2 and the inside section of which corresponds to that of the said tenon. In the embodiment shown, the part 5 consists of a sheet metal plate which has been cut out and folded over a portion of the length of its edges so as to form, in

Patented June 18, 1957 addition to the mortise slide, two lateral lugs 5a (Fig. 2) and an extension 5b without rim or flanges which terminates, in the same manner as is customary, at the bottom of the waist C. The attachment of the part 5 to the bottom of the insole 4, which is for instance made of leather, is effected by means of nails, some of which 6 are arranged in the axis of the said part while others 7 are arranged on the lugs 5a. As can be noted from Figs. 1 and 2, the entire portion of part 5, located in front of the heel seat, is concealed by the outsole 8, attached as customary to the insole 4 by any suitable means.

This being the case, it can easily be seen that in order to mount the heel it is merely necessary to engage the tenon 2 in the mortise slide 5 and to push it until the said heel comes against the extreme edge 8a of the sole 8. Preferably, the cross-sectional areas are such that the sliding of the tenon in the slide is effected with slight force which in suflicient to hold the heel with perfect tightness to the shoe.

However, without going beyond the scope of the invention, a locking system and preferably an automatic locking system could be provided which might consist for instance of a conical-head spring catch 9 which, housed in the heel and protruding beyond the tenon 2, is automatically locked in a hole 10 of the sole of the slide 5 and is disengaged when the heel is pulled towards the outside.

It can easily be seen that it is suflicient to provide an assortment of heels of different shape (Louis XV, boot, etc.) or different shape or style or different colors or both, so that by means of the present invention it is possible to convert a shoe practically instantaneously without the need of any tool and without the exertion of any great force.

It goes without saying that the invention is not limited to the embodiment described and shown and that it covers all variants thereof.

I claim:

1. In a ladies shoe, the improvements consisting of a replaceable heel assembly wherein the heel is detachably secured to the shoe by means of an elongated tenon having an inner secured section and a section extending from the front of the heel, said tenon being trapezoidal in crosssection and curved along a circular arc in the direction of its length, the inner section secured to the heel, the tenon engageable with the shoe by friction sliding, in a slide of a corresponding metal mortice fastened beneath the shoe insole, and extending from beneath the heel seat section of the shoe to the bottom part of the waist section of the shoe, an outer sole covering said mortice and having an edge terminating adjacent the heel seat section, the heel adapted to be manually removed by pulling the tenon from the mortice, and replaced by pushing the tenon into the heel mortice slide until the heel abuts the side edge of the outer sole.

2. In a replaceable heel asssembly for shoes, an elongated curved metal tenon, trapezoidal in cross-section secured to the heel and having an outwardly extending section protruding beyond the heel, a channeled mortice adapted to receive and frictionally hold said tenon, secured to the heel insole and extending from the heel seat section to the bottom of the waist section, a portion of the opposing sides of the channel of the mortice bent back to form a pair of lugs, fasteners inserted through the lugs to anchor the mortice slide to the heel seat section, an outer sole covering said mortice and having an edge terminating adjacent the heel seat section, whereby the heel can be removed from the shoe and replaced on the shoe at will by until the heel abuts the edge of the outer sole.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Gabriel Jan. 19, 1932 4 Aifronte July 30, 1935 Smith Mar. 22, 1938 FOREIGN PATENTS Switzerland Oct. 1, 1951 France May 26, 1930 

